Dave Cushman wrote:

>The circumstances that Wedmore referred to was in a population of bees that
>had already been artificially enlarged so that they would have longer
>tongues. There was a widely held opinion that such bees could gather more
>honey.

In my particular circumstance a bee with a larger tongue would most
definitely collect more honey.  In Prince Edward Island almost all the
clover in hayfields is red clover. At one time alsike clover was also
included in hayseed and showed up in good quantity in second year fields,
but with present alsike clover prices this has been dropped, and in addition
a great deal of clover hay is plowed up after a single year now as it is in
rotation with potatoes.  I am not sure why size of the bee is a constraint
on length of the tongue.  Could not selection be made just for a longer
tongue?  It is pretty frustrating to walk through huge fields of clover in
full bloom with the only buzz coming from bumblebees.

>I now believe that smaller bees are more efficient. These are not really
>smaller they are just the same size as they were 100 years ago. Thus the
>smaller faster bee is capable of gathering more honey due to shorter flying
>times and longer working lives.

Please elaborate on this reasoning Dave.  Why is a smaller bee necessarily
more efficient?  Why should a smaller bee necessarily be faster?  Why should
it live longer?

>There are overwintering advantages in the
>more compact brood nest

Larger bees have a more favourable surface to volume ratio for resistance to
cold.  Why should the brood nest of small bees be more compact?  Bumblebees
are certainly able to fly and work at much lower temperatures than
honeybees.  The larger size also enables them to buzz pollinate.  On the
whole, except for the difficulties in producing and maintaining large
numbers of them bumblebees are way way ahead of honeybees as pollinators (of
some things such as blueberries and pumpkins anyway).

> and if there is a better resistance to varroa and
>acarine mite then all these features seem to point to better and easier
>beekeeping by re-establishing the bees at the size they were before we
>altered them.

I have difficulty following the argument about size.  If the cell size is
bigger then I can see where it might make for more space for varroa.  But if
both the cell size AND the bee size are bigger then where is the extra
space?  The larva will still fill the cell.

And I might note that in a thread on varroa on the bombus list a few years
ago it was mentioned that although bumblebees have been seen with varroa
mites sometimes, they do not persist in their colonies because they chew
them up (bigger size, bigger mandibles). It was claimed that when they were
experimentally infected with varroa that the sound of them crunching them up
was quite audible.

Regards,
Stan